Thank goodness for the summer Olympics! Watching our world athletes showcasing their athletic skills and national pride while hugging one another across national lines after their events in the water, on the fields, in the stadiums, is exactly the kind of human kindness that we desperately need! There is much to emulate in the spirit of the Olympics in our political processes and in our policy work.
As we wrap up July and transition into August, it’s been a rollercoaster ride politically. And hang on because we are just getting started! Whether you are feeling hopeful or confused, I know many of us are feeling surprised by how our emotions have been on a constant up and down, sometimes daily. As a country, we’ve lived through an assassination attempt on a former President, a withdrawal of our sitting U.S. President as an incumbent candidate for renomination, and the overnight campaigning of a woman of color for the Democratic ticket, in a seven-day period!
But it’s not just the election politics that makes us happy to succumb to the distractions of the games in Paris.
Overall, our policy discourse seems to be on a fast downward spiral and highly strained at the local, state and national levels. This makes it an extremely challenging time to lead. And yet, leadership matters greatly! The transitions we are living through in this generation make it even more critical for us to come together to demonstrate respect, decency, and discourse, while leading with great empathy, love and care for the people and communities we serve. We cannot turn away from the looming policy issues impacting schools and communities from homelessness to the mental health crisis to health care access challenges to the othering of people.
In the spirit of bringing in new voices and stories, The Stories We Must Tell this month features an ally to the work of women’s empowerment, San Antonio Superintendent Dr. Jaime Aquino. I know that you will enjoy our discussion as he focuses on student agency as a cornerstone of his leadership. In his interview, Dr. Aquino quotes the traditional Swahili greeting of the Maasai people of Kenya, Kasserian Ingera, or “and how are the children?” Dr. Aquino shares with us his mindset and strategies for being sure that he can respond, “the children are well.” Are your students well?
The 2024-25 school year will require us to fully leverage our network to stay focused on uplifting our children, our staff, our communities and each other. Leadership does not happen in a vacuum, it cannot be delivered alone. I urge you to call upon each other.
The Voice4Equity network can provide you with a confidential coach. If you are a first year Superintendent or you are about to transition to a new leadership role as a School Principal, Director, or Cabinet member, a confidential coach provides a valuable sounding board to help you recognize changing political situations, new strategies, and just-in-time approaches. A coach is not for the leader who is struggling but rather for the leader who wants to advance a student-centered agenda in this political environment. If you are a Board member, you also have a responsibility for ensuring longevity of leadership through coaching. Voice4Equity has highly experienced former superintendents who will never disclose that they are coaching you because we value that sacred, trusting relationship.
We also have two outstanding signature programs around policy and political voice. Sign up today for the Women Superintendents’ Policy Leadership Academy fall cohort, where we come together online for 10 hours over two months of critical policy conversations and strategy sharing. Many of our participants took bold steps after the program, from becoming Superintendents, pursuing their doctorate, organizing policy convening in their local communities, and stepping up their equity work. We also have our Girls Policy Network (GPN) for high school girls in grades 10-12 that I urge you to bring to your district. This is an empowering program that prepares young ladies by developing their understanding of policy voice in the issues that matter most to them now.
Finally, I want to also share a great learning opportunity in the technology space. Registration is open for the January Tech, Power, and Equity learning conference, where women leaders across business and education will collaboratively explore, discuss, and grow our AI knowledge related to tools, approaches, and decisions that we can use to advance equity of access to quality learning in our classrooms, schools, organizations, and districts. We invite our superintendent allies to join us by registering the women leaders on their teams as we collectively and unapologetically advance an equity of access agenda for our nation’s students to have representative leadership and appropriate access to high-quality and safe instructional technology tools.
In the spirit of the Olympics, our individual non-negotiable dedication to excellence brought together in the collective will mean a more successful, equitable, and innovative future for our nation’s students.
Abrazaos!
Christina
